I'm pretty critical when I get crap customer service, and have complained bitterly here about some retailers recently (looking at you M&S, House of Fraser and Sweaty Betty), but it struck me today that I have also had some lovely and helpful customer service, which has really impressed me. I'm not sure if it's because smaller retailers give their customer service staff more authority to make 'exception' decisions, or because you are more likely to be talking to an in-house person, or if they are still close enough to their customer that good relationships matter. But in the last couple of weeks Lily Blanche (Jewellery) Sosander (clothing) and Poetry (Clothing) have all really blown me away. Whether it's been about putting right something that went wrong, or about making an exception to a policy, I've ended up feeling all warm and fuzzy about all of them - and will certainly shop from them again. I think the key thing about all of them was that I felt like a person rather than a credit card with a human attached. So after all my moaning, thought I'd redress the balance :)